Child Therapy

Livewell Counselling Service offers a Child Therapy service to schools and children’s centres in and around Chorley, Lancashire, many of which are Ofsted accredited as Outstanding.

What we offer

For early intervention with children and adolescents we offer:

One to one sessions

Group work

Support the schools

Mentor systems

In order for parents to understand the counselling service, helpful leaflets are available within the schools.

A minimal of 8 sessions is offered, then reviewed regularly.

Schools can buy in full day, half day or hourly counselling session can be arranged.

Assessments will be completed at the start and at the end, with evaluation by the young people themselves included. Consent is required for children under 16 years.

When it is needed

There are times when children suffer from worries and anxiety due to problems at home such as separation or when a parent is ill, or even going to the dentist or starting a new school. This disruption to their lives can result in emotional or behavioural problems such as:

Acting out

Being difficult to control

Being withdrawn

Under achieving

Under functioning

Failing to develop

Therapy through Play

We cannot counsel children in the same way we counsel adults. It can simply be too painful or difficult for a child to speak about the things that are causing them distress; so we have to employ other strategies.

Children’s experiences are often communicated through play; this is a child’s natural form of expression and learning of the world around them. By combining verbal communication with the child’s own natural means of expression we can engage the child in a therapeutic counselling process. Playing with carefully selected materials combined with the interaction of a counsellor, the child is able to explore more fully what is going on for them and to ‘play out’ their feelings.

The fundamental goals of child therapy include:

An opportunity to deal with painful experiences

Reduce anxiety around distressful events happening in child’s life

Helping a child to change behaviours that have negative consequences

Enabling a child to express their thoughts and feelings

Helping a child to develop social skills

Enabling a child to feel good about themselves

“If we could only learn to respond effectively to children at crisis point in their lives, we might save many of them from becoming clients in one capacity or another for the rest of their lives.”